All Time Low
by GARxsBK201
Summary: Songfic dedicated to Karen Kozuki, coping with Lelouch's death. One-shot. Unoriginal title, I know, but gimme a break, man. Rated T for emo-ness.


First Geass fic, hope it's not too bad.

Standard disclaimer applies.

* * *

Zero.

She couldn't believe her eyes.

Bound to a post, ready for death to come, Karen Kozouki could not believe her eyes.

In disbelief, she glanced at her captor, her enemy, the one to have betrayed her and everyone else.

The one who had broken her heart.

The 99th Emperor of Brittania, Lelouch vi Brittania.

He was smiling.

As 'Zero' started running at the Imperial float, time seemed to slow.

And then it all came together.

All the tiny pieces, all those questions she had, they were all in front of her.

And by the time she had gotten over the shock of it all...

He was dead.

The crowd screamed in joy

Karen screamed in sorrow.

"Lelouch, _NO_!"

**She woke up from dreaming and put on her shoes...**

Karen opened her eyes.

Slowly crawling into a sitting position, she stifled a sob. It's been nearly a year since Lelouch's death, and she was still having dreams of him. With her head in her hands, she tried to remember what he looked like...

Finally getting out of bed, she realized that she was still wearing the clothes she had on last night: a non-descript sleeveless hoodie under a discreet leather jacket, and a bland, knee-length skirt.

"What's gotten into you, Karen?" she muttered to herself. "Lelouch would be disappointed..."

Picking her iPod off her bedside table, she plugged in her earphones.

Wiping the tears of the previous night away, Karen headed out the door, slipping on her shoes as she went.

**Started making her way past two in the morning...**

Karen walked around aimlessly, a miserable look on her face, hunched over, with shoulders slumped in defeat.

Misery on two legs.

**She hasn't been sober in days...**

A passing policeman carefully steps around her, a disgusted frown on his face upon sniffing the reeking stench of stale alcohol on Karen's clothes.

"Come on lady, I think you've had enough," the policeman said, doing his best to ignore the stench. "You should get home already."

"I don't want to go home..." muttered Karen, still walking.

**Leaning now, into the breeze...**

"Lady, I really think you should go home. How old are you anywa-" the policeman finally shut up as he recognized her.

Karen had turned around to face him, and seeing her face, the policeman recognized her from her Black Knight days.

Leaving him to mutter his apologies, Karen turned back to her direction, or rather, misdirection, tightening her jacket against the early morning breeze.

**Remebering Sunday, she falls to her knees...**

As she walked along, her thoughts never straying from her time with Lelouch, she remembered a particularly good time with Lelouch.

She smiled faintly as she remembered her and Lelouch's blushes as she had tumbled down on top of him.

But the memory of what he said then quickly wiped her smile away.

"_Karen, when… when all of this is over… will you go back to Ashford with me?"_

Tears streamed down Karen's face.

**They had breakfast together, but two eggs don't last like the feeling of what she needs.**

There were good times she remembered, such as the day when Rivalz had sprayed a bottle of champagne all over her front, and Lelouch and Nunnaly's invitation for her to stay over for breakfast.

But those memories weren't enough to was away the pain.

**Now this place is familliar to her...**

As she wiped her tears away, she took in her surroundings.

She recognized the area.

She was in the Shinjiku reconstruction area, but not just any random area in it.

She was where she had first met Zero, where she had first met Lelouch as the twisted idealist he was, where the formation of the Black Knights had taken place.

Where she had caught Lelouch about to inject himself with refrain.

Remembering something she had done last night, Karen searched her pockets.

**He'd pulled on her hand with a devilish grin, he led her upstairs, he led her upstairs, left them dying to get in...**

Back then, she'd always thought he was an arrogant ass, with that annoying, ever-present smirk on his face. She had always taken everything he gave her for granted. She only realized now he had only been leading her to what he had thought was best for her; guiding her through the toughest situations, giving her all the chances she needed for greatness, instead of giving her the same treatment as everybody else.

Zero Requiem.

He had made sure to maker her hate him, so that she would be able to find a place in the new world he had made for her, and for everybody else, without having to deal with the lingering thoughts of 'what if's and 'if only's that Lelouch would leave in the wake of his plan.

**Forgive me, I'm tring to find, my calling, I'm calling at night…**

She had been drunk, yes, but in a brief moment of time she had felt strangely… _sober._

Sober in the sense of clear thinking without the interference of alcohol, that is. She was still drunk on grief and misery.

She had had an epiphany.

She had set out, leaving the warm comfort of the bar Tamaki operated, embracing the cold of the night.

**I don't mean to be a bother, but have you seen this boy?**

Remembering last nights events, Karen sat down, on the exact same spot she had seen Lelouch sitting.

"_It's just not fair, damn it!," raged Karen at Tamaki, gesticulating wildly, spilling her glass' contents all over the table. "He was the last, the very _last _person who deserved this!"_

_Tamaki kept silent, and wiped up her mess. Almost everyone else had left now, and Tamaki, Karen, and two other unknown patrons were the only ones left in the bar._

**He's been running through my dreams, and it's driving me crazy it seems…**

"_He was the nicest, most kind person I've ever met," Karen muttered, suddenly quiet, with a regretful look on her face. "But all I could think of him while he was alive… was how much of an arrogant ass he was."_

_Chuckling softly to herself, Kallen downed the rest of her drink._

**I'm gonna ask him to marry me…**

"_We were going back to Ashford," Karen continued, now with her face blank, devoid of all emotion. "We were supposed to go back, with all of the others, and we were going to light up the biggest fireworks display anyone had ever seen..."_

_A tear rolled down Karen's face._

_Tamaki sighed and put his washcloth down. Putting his hands on his hips, he began._

"_Karen, stop it," Tamaki said, his tone serious for once. "You've got to stop living in the past._

And that was when Karen got the idea of Refrain.

**---o---**

**And even though he doesn't believe in love…**

She had decided, long ago, that she loved.

Despicable arrogant ass as he was, she had fallen for him.

Even if he had shown the inability to love anyone aside from himself (except Nunally, because she had to admit, it was hard not to love her), she fallen in love with Lelouch.

Or was it Zero, the original Zero, she had fallen in love with?

It didn't matter to her. As far as she was concerned, it was like loving both sides of the same coin.

**She's determined to call his bluff…**

After the unsuccessful mission to recover Nunnaly, Karen decided to call Lelouch. It probably wasn't a good idea to tell him now but…

She couldn't explain to herself what made her want to do it.

She just couldn't find an explanation.

But it was still good enough for her.

**Who could deny these butterflies? They're filling her gut.**

Snapping her phone shut, she wondered what was wrong. She had used the very phone Lelouch had given her, the phone that she had used only for emergencies until now.

Karen walked off the Black Knights' ship, and decided to look for him.

With butterflies filling her up, she headed for Shinjiku, having a good idea where he was.

**Waking the neighbors, unfamiliar faces…**

Running back to her temporary apartment, Karen slammed the door out of the way and jumped into the bed.

Screaming into the pillow, Karen raged.

"Why!? How could he do this!?"

Karen wasn't as upset about the Refrain as she was about this.

_Refrain was his first choice… I came in second._

Karen wiped her tears away.

She knew the neighbors could hear her, and she quieted down.

**---o---**

**She pleads, though she tries, but she's only denied…**

Closing her eyes, Karen kissed him.

She relished the sweet taste of his lips, the cool, crisp, smell of his…

But there was something missing.

Pulling away, Karen opened her eyes.

Lelouch had on an expressionless face.

Trying to hold the tears in, trying to keep her voice steady, looking down at her feet…

She knew the drill.

It was just like when he had been unmasked by the other Black Knights.

That almost familiar feeling of betrayal.

"Goodbye, Lelouch."

**Now she's dying to get inside.**

Karen walked up the stairs as fast as possible, in an attempt to find somewhere, somewhere quiet, so _he_ wouldn't see her cry.

In her haste, she didn't hear Lelouch's whisper.

"Goodbye, Karen."

**---o---**

**The neighbors said he moved away…**

Karen didn't care what they said.

Hugging her jacket against her, she walked away from Tamaki's bar.

They all said he had only used them, in order to suit himself, in order to take over the world.

_I know better._

**Funny how it rained all day…**

It was kind of funny, actually, now that she thought about it.

As if on cue, the rain started falling exactly as she thought that.

Hearing the crunch of shoes on asphalt alerted her to someone's approach.

Turning around, she saw one of the two remaining patrons of Tamaki approaching her rapidly. She shifted uneasily, unsure if he was a threat or not. The man didn't _seem _like he wanted to hurt her, but a feeling in her gut told her the she shouldn't trust him.

It turned out he was a Refrain dealer.

**---o---**

**Didn't think much of it then…**

Snapping back to the present, Karen stared at the syringe in her hands.

She had forgotten to get a syringe from the dealer, but how fortunate it was that she had been able to find Lelouch's own syringe, albeit a bit dusty, in perfect working condition?

_Very, _she thought. _Almost as if it was fated._

**But it's starting to all make sense.**

With shaking hands, Karen plugged the vial into the syringe.

The shaking only got worse as she brought it to her arm.

She closed her eyes.

**Oh, I can see now…**

Taking a deep breath, she opened her eyes again.

There was a man leaning on a stack of construction supplies, clothed in an outfit similar with hers, in terms of being overly ordinary. He wore a light blue hoodie under a long, brown jacket, along with a pair of your run-of-the-mill jeans, with his face hidden by the cap he wore and his hood.

Though Karen couldn't see his face, it was obvious he was staring at her.

Eyes widening at the thought of being caught, Karen panicked.

"What do you want?" she asked, feeling strangely calm. She had a gut feeling she could incapacitate or kill this person before he would be able to stop or report her.

**That all of these clouds are following me, in my desperate endeavor…**

The man kept silent, and merely stood up straighter, brushing off the dust on the shoulder that he had leant on.

As the man approached her, Karen felt uneasy.

The man seemed… familiar, in a way.

**To find my whoever…**

"Don't do it," he said in a low voice. "I know why you think it'll help, and I'm telling you, it definitely won't"

Karen tilted her head in confusion. Not at his words, but at the fact that his voice was eerily familiar, yet, unfamiliar.

"What do you know?" spat Karen, shaking off the feeling of familiarity.

"I know why you think it'll help," repeated the man. "You think it'll bring him back."

Karen recoiled in surprise. Reaching for her purse, she prepared to flick the blade out.

**Wherever he may be…**

"**He's not coming back**," said the stranger. "**He's done something so terrible he was terrified to speak, **but I'm guessing you'd **expect that from him**."

Karen sneered.

"And how would you know that?"

"I was the other man in the bar last night," the man replied simply. "And I knew the other was a Refrain dealer."

Karen gaped.

She had thought there would be something bigger behind the familiarity, but it turned out to be something rather petty.

"You weren't exactly discreet with your discussion with Tamaki," the man added.

Karen gulped.

And then she sighed.

"You're right."

Throwing the syringe down on the ground, Karen crushed the vial, still attached to the syringe, beneath her foot.

Walking away from the man, Karen glanced back at him.

The man was now sitting where she had been sitting, albeit gazing at the stars, instead of deliberating the use of Refrain.

"Thank you," she said, loud enough for the man to hear.

He glanced at her and merely nodded, before returning his attention to the night, or, rather, early morning sky.

Long after Karen had left, the man was still there, staring at the stars, singing under his breath:

**I'm mixed up, I'll be blunt:**

**Now the rain is washing you out of my hair, and out of my mind…**

**Keeping an eye on the world, so many thousands of feet off the ground,**

**I'm over you now, I'm at home in the clouds,**

**Towering over your head…**

As amethyst eyes ceased their stargazing, the man got up, brushed off the dust on his pants, and walked away, smiling to himself and muttering under his breath.

"I may be keeping an eye out for you, but I doubt I'm a candidate to enter heaven…"

**---o---**

Entering her apartment, Karen decided to get back into bed.

Drowsiness beginning to overtake her, she was conscious for long enough to hear the end of the song currently playing on the iPod that she had left on the entire 2 hours she had gone out.

**Well I guess I'll go home now…**

**I guess I'll go home now…**

**I guess I'll go home now…**

**I guess I'll go home.**

**

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**

In case you're wondering "What the hell she had one song repeat for two hours?"... No, Karen didn't have it on repeat for two hours. I just wrote the story in ways that would relate to each line, and she was (most likely) listening to some emo playlist.

I dunno.

Whatever.

Anyway~~

Took some liberties with the song to make it fit, just a switching of places, is all...

Hope you liked it :D

Review plzzzz


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